An investigation was opened for “attempted murder” by the Toulouse prosecutor’s office, Friday, January 21, after the assault of a septuagenarian by a 34-year-old man who had escaped two days earlier from a city hospital. Interned for several years in a psychiatric establishment after having killed, then eaten the heart and the tongue of a 90-year-old man in Nouilhan (Hautes-Pyrénées) in November 2013, this former soldier, deemed irresponsible criminally, was arrested by the Toulouse police, after the intervention of several inhabitants of the Chalets district who came to intervene and control him.
His new victim, a 72-year-old retiree, was hospitalized with multiple arm fractures and head wounds. The Toulouse prosecutor’s office has commissioned a new psychiatric expertise to verify the responsibility at the time of the facts of the one who is nicknamed “the cannibal of the Pyrenees”. Here is what we know about this affair.
A new tragedy avoided thanks to the intervention of neighbors
Wednesday, January 19 in the middle of the afternoon, Jeremy Rimbaud escaped from Marchant hospital in Toulouse. Seven kilometers from the hospital center where he was interned, he comes face to face with a 72-year-old retiree walking her dog in a street near the center of town. He then hits her violently on the head with a wooden stick, according to several witnesses of the scene. Several of them decide to intervene to try to put an end to the aggression.
A neighbor armed with an unloaded gun even decides to threaten him before the attacker tries to snatch it away from him. “I happen to have a dummy weapon at home, which allows me to intervene and try to intimidate the attacker”explained this resident to BFMTV. “I was probably under the influence of adrenaline, I ordered him to get down, I had this dummy weapon which allowed me to hold him a little in sight, and in respect”. Hit with a butt, the aggressor is finally mastered and kept on the ground, pending the arrival of firefighters and police on site.
“It is alarming to say that he is a repeat offender, but it is reassuring to see that people very quickly intervened to defend this lady. It puts balm in the heart, there was a reaction and it ‘is great”, reacted in particular Zoé, a witness of the scene, at the microphone of France Bleu Toulouse.
The courageous intervention of the inhabitants of the Chalets district undoubtedly saved the life of the victim, who was lucid when help arrived. According to testimony collected by The Dispatch and BFMTVthe aggressor has “opposed no resistance” at the time of his arrest by the police, who had set up an important surveillance device near the family home of Jérémy Rimbaud, several hours earlier.
A former soldier suffering from post-traumatic stress
Nicknamed “the cannibal of the Pyrenees”Jérémy Rimbaud was arrested in November 2013 for having killed a 90-year-old man with a metal bar in Nouilhan (Hautes-Pyrénées), before eating his heart and tongue. He then tried to kill another inhabitant of this small village.
Declared criminally irresponsible after this sordid murder, he has since been interned in a psychiatric hospital, in the closed unit for difficult patients in Cadillac, in Gironde. Transferred recently for a brief stay at the Marchant hospital in Toulouse, he took advantage of a moment of inattention by the nursing staff to escape.
This former soldier from Momères, not far from Tarbes (Hautes-Pyrénées), spent five years in a marine tank infantry regiment based in Poitiers. After missions in Afghanistan in 2010 and 2011, he stayed in Cyprus for a psychological evaluation. Post-traumatic stress syndrome was then diagnosed. Jérémy Rimbaud had mentioned “external forces“, saying “having received orders by voices“to justify his acting out at the time.
Hearing of the victim and new psychiatric expertise
Despite his hospitalization, multiple arm fractures and several head wounds, the police hope to be able to hear the new victim of Jérémy Rimbaud as soon as possible, even as early as next week.
The Toulouse prosecutor’s office, which immediately opened an investigation for “attempted murder”, also wishes to verify the responsibility of the author at the time of the facts with a new psychiatric expertise.
According to our colleagues from France Bleu, the inhabitants of the Chalets district remain in shock from this violent attack and could also be heard again by the investigators.